


Day Twenty-One: Clary & Isabelle

by claryherondale



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments (Movies), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Best Friends, Christmas, F/F, Flashbacks, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Love, New York, New York City, Night Terrors, No Smut, One Shot, Past Sexual Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-22
Updated: 2016-12-22
Packaged: 2018-09-11 01:08:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8947174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/claryherondale/pseuds/claryherondale
Summary: Day 21 of My 31 Favorite ShipsClary and Isabelle discuss the horrors they faced while Sebastian was alive.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [@alineblackthorn on instagram](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=%40alineblackthorn+on+instagram).



> There isn't any smut or fluff in this, considering I have previously written a smutty Clizzy one shot (it's With Loss of Eden if you want to check it out).
> 
> Clary does mention Sebastian's rape attempt, so CW there. 
> 
> Gifted to @alineblackthorn on Instagram, who will probably never see this, because she's the one who inspired me after we had a conversation about the missed opportunity for Clizzy to become each other's biggest supports after the end of the Dark War.

Clary stood in front of the mirror in her bathroom, pulling her bright red hair out of her freckled face and messily tying it up. She gripped the sides of her porcelain sink with shaking hands, her eyes swollen with recent tears. 

There was a knock on the door, and Jocelyn called out, “Clary, Luke and I are going out to do some last-minute Christmas shopping. Are you going to be alright here alone?”

“I think Isabelle is going to be stopping by soon, so yes, I’ll be fine,” said Clary, successfully sounding as though she wasn’t just crying.

“Alright, we’ll be back later,” Jocelyn told her. 

Clary waited until she heard the front door open and shut before she left the bathroom. She was walking out into the living room when it hit her again—the flashbacks. They weren’t always this detrimental to her, but right now, they were crippling. Clary fell to her knees on the carpet, clutching her chest and gasping. Everything was spinning. There was a distinctive, light tapping on the front door, an elegant but pronounced sound that rang of everything Isabelle. Clary tried to get up off of the floor, but she was struggling to even breathe. After a moment of Clary not responding, Isabelle walked into the house. 

When Izzy saw Clary on the carpet, she immediately dropped down beside her and wrapped her arms around her friend.

“Clary, take deep, slow breaths,” Isabelle instructed.

Clary tried her best to slow her intake of air, and gradually, everything stopped spiraling dizzily around her and returned to normal. 

When she could finally catch enough breath to talk, Clary said, “I’m sorry, Iz.”

“No, don’t apologize. You have nothing to be sorry for. Do you think you can get up onto the couch?”

“Yeah.”

Isabelle helped Clary stand up and then rest back on the nearby sofa. 

“I feel like less than a Shadowhunter,” said Clary after a moment. “Shadowhunters don’t care about trauma. They just move on. And I—I can’t.”

“Listen to me. You are not less than a Shadowhunter. You are more than the average Shadowhunter, don’t you know that? Shadowhunters are still half-human. We are affected by the things we do and see. Not to mention that what we went through was far beyond anything the normal Nephilim does. You’re a hero, Clary. But being a hero come at a price. And . . . well, you’re not the only one suffering from the events we went through. I mean, we literally went through hell. I get night terrors now. It’s like a nightmare, only intensified, and when I wake up, I don’t immediately recognize that it wasn’t real. I started keeping weapons out of my room because I would get up and lash out. I broke a few lamps, and not the fun way.”

“What are your night terrors normally about?” Clary asked carefully. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t feel comfortable with it.”

Izzy gave a noncommittal smile. “I’m not ashamed. I have no problem talking about it. They’re normally about Sebastian. And Max. There are a lot of night terrors where I’m trying to save Max, but I can’t get to him, and I always find him dead. Sebastian comes up to me and knocks me out—the way he did in the Penhallows’ kitchen. What do you have flashbacks about? Things that happened while you were with Sebastian and the Jace who wasn’t really Jace?”

“Yeah,” said Clary distantly. “I . . . there were some things I didn’t tell everyone about during that time, because there was just so much going on that I didn’t think it mattered. But it bothers me more than I’m willing to admit.”

“What is it?” 

“Right before the ritual where Sebastian did the first ascension for the Endarkened, we . . . I fought against him. And when that happened, he held me up against a wall and kissed me. I got him off of me, but then he threw me into a glass table and he, well . . . he stuck his hand down my pants. He was going to rape me. I stopped him before he could, but he still put his fingers inside me.”

Clary cast her eyes downward, not wanting to see the expression on Isabelle’s face. The other girl was silent for a moment, processing Clary’s confession. The quiet wasn’t exactly uncomfortable; it was just reflective.

Isabelle rested her hand on Clary’s after a moment, and Clary looked up at the other girl. Izzy’s eyes were shining fiercely, a sparkling gleam across her dark brown irises.

“Clary, you are the bravest person I have ever known, and I am always going to be here to not only kick the ass of anyone who threatens you—although you certainly don’t need help protecting yourself—but I am also going to be by your side any time you want to talk, or need advice, or want to cry on my shoulder, or want a distraction, and everything in between. I want you to know that, okay? You are the best friend that I have ever had. And we’re going to work through this together. Even if it’s a struggle for the rest of our lives, we are not going to let Sebastian’s terror hold power over us. I would kill that son of a bitch if he wasn’t already dead. But you getting to send him to his grave, letting Jonathan free, was the best justice we could have gotten. We’re going to be alright. I promise.”

“I love you, Izzy.” Clary smiled a little. “You’re definitely the best female friend that I’ve ever had.”

“Well, I suppose that’s all I could ask for. No one can outweigh your friendship with . . .” Isabelle cast her eyes down. “I’m sorry.”

She had forgotten. It was easy to forget. They all did sometimes.

Clary bit the inside of her cheek, keeping her tears at bay. “I’m sorry too, Iz. You’re my best friend now. And I couldn’t ask for anyone better. It’s going to be a good Christmas this year, okay? We deserve to have a good first Christmas after the Dark War.”

“And we will. We’ll have it away from the Institute—I’ll be just the five of us: you, me, Jace, Alec, and Magnus.”

“Don’t forget Chairman Meow.”

“How could I? The first party we went to at Magnus’s apartment was in celebration of Chairman Meow’s birthday.” Isabelle smiled. “Is your mom okay with you spending the night at Magnus’s on Christmas Eve?”

“Well, she doesn’t exactly consider Magnus a responsible adult, but she has gotten way more lenient now that Valentine and Sebastian are dead. So, yeah, she said it’s okay. She isn’t particularly happy about it, especially since I will be sleeping in the same space as my boyfriend, but I think part of her is relieved that she can spend some time alone with Luke. Plus, she talked to Magnus and made him promise that he would make me and Jace stay in separate rooms.” Clary cleared her throat and smiled. “Although Magnus told me that, as a Christmas gift, he would secretly disregard her demand.”

“If she would just let you live at the Institute, she could have every night alone with Luke.”

“Live at the Institute with my boyfriend and hardly any parental supervision? I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

“Someday,” said Isabelle dreamily.

Clary grinned and took Izzy’s hand, their fingers twining together. 

“Someday,” she agreed.

Clary rested her fiery red head against Isabelle’s shoulder, and Izzy turned and placed a feather light kiss against her orange hair. For a while they just sat there like that, comforting each other with nothing but the contact of skin covered in curling, black runes that marked them as who they were, the golden ichor in their veins that bound them in more ways than one.

**Author's Note:**

> Hint for tomorrow's ship:  
> he proposed to her on Christmas Eve


End file.
